PE Mental Health faces financial crisis after subsidy slashed

THE only organisation providing a community rehabilitation service in the Eastern Cape for people with psychiatric and intellectual disabilities is in a major financial crisis.

This comes after the provincial Department of Social Development slashed the Port Elizabeth Mental Health’s budget by almost half.

The organisation’s director, Limeez Arends, said they were still in shock after receiving the news earlier this month.

The organisation has been operating in the city since 1939. It provides services the department does not have the capacity to do.

“The decision to cut our budget and allocated staff by 43% will have dire consequences for the provision of social work services to persons with mental disabilities,” she said.

Arends said the grant had been virtually unchanged for years.

“We had no reason to anticipate such a drastic cut in funding. Social work staff will have to be retrenched which will reduce the impact of our services,” she said.

Arends said social workers had been stationed at clinics in the northern areas but they would have to be withdrawn.

“Each of these social workers are seeing more than a hundred people,” she said.

“I must stress that the department does not have the capacity to deliver these services.”

Arends said they were also the only organisation that assisted mental patients to be reintegrated into the community

‘ We had no reason to anticipate such a drastic cut in funding

when they respond well enough to treatment and therapy.

“We also provide counselling, crisis intervention, advocacy and assisting those affected with disability grant issues,” she said.

“We further assist with financial support and provide food parcels to the most vulnerable.”

Arends said the budget cuts came as a shock as representatives from premier Phumulo Masualle’s office visited them last month saying they wanted to partner with them.

“He told us that they were not equipped to deliver these services,” she said.

“An increased number of people are diagnosed with serious mental illnesses in our communities.

“Hospitals such as Elizabeth Donkin in Port Elizabeth are having to operate beyond their capacity – simply as a result of too many people demanding acute care.

“Support and assistance with addressing social issues are critical to care in the community.

“This problem will be exacerbated even further without access to specialist social work services.”

She said the budget cuts would force them to choose which communities to service and which to leave.

“I shudder to think how our communities will cope without this service,” Arends said.

“With the imminent closure of the two subsidised frail care facilities in Port Elizabeth, we also anticipate increased calls for assistance from families needing this service.”

Social Development spokesman Mzukisi Solani failed to respond to a request for comment.